Misery, Learned

When I was a kid, I believed that happiness could be bought—the logic being that any time I felt unhappy, I could simply buy whatever thing the absence of which was making me feel that way.

New shoes.
Video games.
CDs.
So on.

Like many, my definition of happiness was anchored to the ownership of things. And like many, it seemed simple to me: those with the most, had the most—and those who had the most were the happiest.

I even remember being challenged: "What if you fall in love with someone who doesn't love you? You can't buy them." I thought, "Of course you can. Just buy everything that makes them happy and they'll love you for it."

But soon after that, I fell for a girl in class who couldn't buy any of the things I wanted. And even if she could have, I wanted nothing anyway; only her.

Alongside my attraction to her came the realization that my abrupt unhappiness had nothing to do with any lack of things owned. Lo and behold, it was more complicated than that. And as such, so was I.

And so was attraction.
And love.
And probably others things too
—maybe even everything.

As it was, with that wisdom came the thought that if I felt the way that I did so suddenly, then she may already feel some kind of way too. And if she did, then no matter how much I might ever be able to buy her, the possibility would always remain that it may never be enough—a lesson which introduced me to a brand of unhappiness out of which one can never buy themself, and which goes by the name, Misery.

Perhaps some lessons are better left unlearned.